One type of lying that is very irritating and very hard to meet is
that known as prevarication. This consists in telling a part of a
truth, or even a whole truth, in such a way as to convey a false
impression, and is most common at about twelve or thirteen years.
When a child resorts to prevarication he is already old enough to
know the difference between a truthful statement and a false
statement. Indeed, it is when he most keenly realizes this that he
is most likely to prevaricate, for this is but a device by which the
childish mind attempts to achieve an indirect purpose and at the
same time keep his peace with his conscience. It is when he already
has a certain fear of lying, and is not yet thoroughly sincere and
truth-loving, that he will come home from the truant fishing party
and ingeniously tell you that a "friend of Harry's" caught the fish,
instead of saying that he himself did it. His conscience is quite
satisfied with the reflection that he _is_ a friend of Harry's.
In this stage of his career the child is quite capable of
understanding a direct analysis of what is essentially a deception,
and a good heart-to-heart talk that comes to a conclusion is about
the best thing he can get.

I hope you will not think, from what I have said, that I have been
trying to justify lying, or that I do not consider lying a serious
matter; nor, on the other hand, that you will consider a single
application of the remedies suggested sufficient to make any child
truthful. Thoroughgoing truthfulness comes hard and generally comes
late. But for the majority of children truthfulness is attainable,
although it will not be attained without a struggle. The finer
instincts often enough lead to violations of strict veracity; but
they may be made also to strengthen the feeling of scrupulous regard